The formation of hay bales is, of course, well known. Such balers are used in agricultural operations in the field to form harvested hay into bales having generally either rectangular or circular dimensions. The bales so formed allow improved handling and storage and have a weight which allows convenient manipulation following their formation. Such bales are typically stored and used in locations relatively close to the harvesting location.
Commercial markets have now been established for forage in locations far removed from where the forage crop is harvested and formed into bales. For example, markets in the Asian and Middle Eastern countries have opened for forage from material harvested in North America and Australia. Thus, the transportation of such forage at a reasonable cost and maintaining such forage in marketable condition during transportation has become an important focus in order to profitably sell such forage.
Forage compactors to recompact standard hay bales are known. Such compactors generally act to take standard hay bales, separate the material making up the bales and recompact such material at a density which is much greater than the density of the forage in a standard bale while retaining generally the same dimensions. Thus, the recompacted bale may be shipped utilizing a far more efficient volume of space with an increased quantity of forage making up the bale
A typical forage compactor is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,001,974 (Gombos) entitled HAY BALE RECOMPACTING SYSTEM. Gombos teaches a compactor having an inlet allowing the crop to enter into a compression chamber where the crop is compressed. Following compression, the crop leaves the compression chamber from an outlet positioned on the opposite side of the compression chamber from the inlet. A strapping operation is disclosed in which straps encircle each bale. The strapping operation takes place following the removal of the forage from the compression chamber.
The Gombos apparatus, however, suffers disadvantages. First an operator must be located on the same side of the compactor as the strapping unit since strapping units are not reliable under the severe operating conditions of the compactor. In order to properly remove twines from the incoming bales, an operator should be located on the inlet side of the compression chamber; that is, near the end of the main compression cylinder where the operator is in proximity to the highly stressed tie rods of the compression cylinder and the hydraulic hoses providing the high pressure hydraulic oil feeding the cylinder. This position is not a preferred operator location because the chances for an accident are increased. Further, being located at this point does not allow the operator to ensure that the scaling of the product is consistent. To overcome the latter problem, yet another operator is needed. The former problem relating to safety considerations remains.
A further disadvantage with Gombos is that the inlet and outlet locations located on opposite sides of the compression chamber necessarily dictate that the plant layout is inefficient. The forage compactor must be centrally located on the plant floor as opposed to being located against a wall, for example, where better overall utilization of floor space area can occur.